Research & Planning: History of Music Videos

The music video is a very large part of media these days, with a whole section of SkyTV dedicated to 24 hour music video channels, producers and directors are in high regard.
The first ever music video is supposedly the one shown above, it was shot in 1894 at Thomas Edison's laboratory. 
Nowadays, music videos are used as promotional tools to sell a song. In the past they were used to accompany a song to create more enjoyable experience for the consumer.
Many performers and bands have pushed the limits of music videos by creating raunchy and explicit videos etc. Some have created feature length films to accompany their music. e.g. Pink Floyd, Kanye West etc.





For some artists, music videos have been a strong political tool while accompanying a particularly strong minded and lyrically challenging song. In the video below Eminem is challenging the US citizens to stand againt George Bush and his administration. This music video gained huge publicity and favour in the media.



The birth of websites such as Youtube have had a very big effect on music videos and how they are produced. In the past, music videos have had massive budgets and have always strived to be the biggest and the best with the most explosions and special effects as possible, now with Youtube, the more quirky and low budget videos seem to gain the most popularity with viewers. Inventive videos like OK GO have gained incredible media and have created international success for a relatively unknown band previously.